On October 1, 1957, the "Eight Traitors" established Fairchild Semiconductor Company. This directly allowed the United States to further lead the development of the global chip industry until today. In recent years, everyone has known that chips are the most severely choked area

On October 1, 1957, the "Eight Traitors" established Fairy Child Semiconductor Company . This directly allowed the United States to further lead the development of the global chip industry until today.

In recent years, everyone has known that chips are the most severely choked area in my country and are the focus of technological struggle. However, people often make some remarks that seem reasonable but are actually very false, believing that China can solve the chip problem in a few days, or think that it can overtake and develop technology that replaces chips. This ultimately comes from a lack of respect for the half-century struggle of scientists around the world.

号号 's "life" is such a revelation. In this context, we should trace the origin and master the development laws of chips.

01

"Eight Traitors" "core"

904 British physicist Fleming invented the electronic diode, and in 1906 American inventor De Forrest invented the electronic transistor. Electronics has developed rapidly as an emerging discipline. At that time, the source of world science and technology was Europe, and the United States was still in the process of digestion, absorption and catching up. After the invention of electronic tube , its main applications were radio communications and computers. But soon after, the United States became the new owner of the stage.

htmlThe main battlefields of the two world wars that broke out in the 120th century were in Europe, resulting in a sharp decline in the population of Europe, a large number of talents outflows, and serious damage to productivity. The United States was far away from the war at that time, and the large number of military-industrial orders benefited the United States' industry, economy, technology and other aspects. The United States' economy experienced the fastest growth period since its founding. World War II helped the United States, the battlefield in Asia was in a mess, the world's top talents poured into the United States, and the World Science and Technology Center also began to transfer from Europe to the United States.

956, Shockley, the "father of transistor " was invited by Terman, vice president of Stanford University in California and the "father of of " Silicon Valley" and founded the " Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory " in the industrial park near Stanford University, to prepare to produce silicon transistors, which also made "Silicon Valley" famous and became the cradle of American semiconductors.

William Shockley with his staff (including Godden Moore , Robert Noyce , Sheldon Roberts and Jay Rust) celebrated his contribution to 1956 Nobel Prize . Source: Computer History

At this time, a large number of young talents joined, but due to management issues, eight people including Neus , Moore later left together and founded Fairchild Semiconductor. These eight people were called "Eight Traitors" by Shockley. Batches of chip elite talents have emerged from Fairchild Semiconductor, and semiconductor technology companies have emerged like mushrooms after a rain, including many of the chip giants that followed.

"Eight Traitors" Source: Intel and PBS

It is no exaggeration to say that Fairchild has made Silicon Valley Silicon Valley and wrote the glorious history of Silicon Valley.

02

The seeds of fairy child are floating around

As the years pass, the fairy child's own destiny has changed. The company fell into financial trouble in the late 1960s — facing new competition from regional startups, which caused the stock price to fall.

With the continuous loss of talents and the continuous emergence of competitors, it is certainly inevitable that Fairy Child's decline will go downhill. From 1965 to 1968, Fairchild Semiconductor's sales continued to decline. In 1967, Fairchild Semiconductor suffered its first loss since its inception - a loss of US$7.6 million. The stock fell from US$3 per share a year ago to US$0.5, and its market value shrank by half.

also started in 1967, and the key departure of Noyce and Moore caused harm to Fairchild. The duo formed Intel , which will become one of Fairchild's biggest competitors.

Fairchild Semiconductor began selling business units that had become liable and continued to close locations throughout the 1970s. After being acquired by National Semiconductor in 1987, the company disappeared from the commercial spotlight.The $200 million deal (more than $471 million in today’s dollar count) brings a new umbrella to Fairchild. However, through a series of corporate acquisitions, it did achieve significant growth in the 1990s and early 2000s, with Fairchild capturing a larger market share. But unfortunately, the 2010s were a turning point for Fairy Child. The company was finally acquired and absorbed by ON Semiconductor in 2016.

Although Fairy Child no longer exists, it completely changed the semiconductor industry, such as prompting the widespread adoption of silicon materials instead of germanium. It also helped to bring MOSFET technology to the spotlight. The company grew up from a collective of eight upstarts and eventually accumulated over 11,000 employees.

Fairy Child is over, but the story continues. Apple Jobs once vividly compared it: "Fairy Children's Semiconductor Company is like a mature dandelion. Once you blow it, the seeds of this entrepreneurial spirit will flutter around in the wind."

In just 12 years since its establishment, Fairy Children's Semiconductor has 31 spin-off companies. Source: Endeavour Insights

Intel, AMD, Xilinx, Altera, Juji Company and National Semiconductor Company are some of the famous companies on this list. AMD was founded by Jerry Sanders, the director of the sales department at the time. He left with seven fairy child employees. And Intel mentioned just now.

With the outflow of a large number of talents from Fairchild Semiconductor, new semiconductor companies have emerged like mushrooms after a rain.

"Silicon Valley Hot" writes that half of the approximately 70 semiconductor companies in Silicon Valley are direct or indirect descendants of Fairchild Semiconductor. Working at Fairchild Semiconductor is a way to enter semiconductor companies all over Silicon Valley. At an semiconductor engineer conference held in Sunnyvale in 1969, only 24 of the 400 participants had never worked at Fairchild Semiconductor.

It can be said that Fairchild Semiconductor is the "Whampoa Military Academy" of semiconductor talents in Silicon Valley and even the whole world.

03

Water drops through the stone, it is not a day's effort

What were we doing when the United States was fully developing semiconductors in the last century?

1949, New China was just established. After the war, China was full of holes and was in trouble. It was mobilizing the whole country to develop agriculture and heavy industry. The people had just solved the problem of food and clothing. In terms of the economy and talent reserves at that time, they could not participate in this high-end competition. Therefore, China's chips were lagging behind for several generations, and today they are still surpassing Britain and catching up with the United States.

956 The slogan of " entering science into " was proposed, and then the "1956-1967 Science and Technology Development Vision Plan" was formulated. This plan included semiconductor, radio, automation and computing technology in four emergency measures, and the development of the semiconductor industry was placed in a prominent position. Faced with the current situation of urgent talent shortage, from 1956 to 1958, the Ministry of Education concentrated five universities in China, led by Peking University and Fudan University , and opened the first semiconductor professional training class. Through the efforts of a group of overseas returnees in China, more than 300 scientific and technological workers have grown up, and many of them have become the backbone of the semiconductor field. Academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences Wang Yangyuan Academician of Chinese Academy of Engineering Xu Juyan and other talents have emerged, which has laid the talent foundation for the early technological catch-up of China's semiconductor industry and technology. At the same time, American companies are focusing on the market, whether in product development or technology changes.

, and at the same time, Japanese semiconductor companies' technical level is roughly at the same stage as Chinese companies. However, Japan's technology source mainly comes from the technology transfer from the United States. After obtaining the technology authorization from the United States, Japanese companies quickly spread to large domestic companies, prompting the rapid development of Japan's semiconductor industry. In the 1960s, Japan's industries such as home electronics, consumer electronics and automobiles developed rapidly, and these industries brought a large number of product demands, thus promoting the continuous iteration of technology in the semiconductor industry.At this time, in South Korea and Taiwan, the semiconductor industry was in its infancy, and only companies were packaging and testing for foreign semiconductor giants.

Source: Journal of Yellow River University of Science and Technology

But between 1979 and 2000, our semiconductor development fell into the trap of overseas technology introduction and catching up. State-owned electronics and radio plants established in the 1950s and 1960s face huge difficulties in operating. Against the backdrop of institutional transformation, the business types of these state-owned enterprises have also begun to shift from defense services to civilians. Jiangnan Radio Equipment Factory, Wuxi Microelectronics United Company and Huajing Electronics Group have all carried out arduous transformation work. In the early 1980s, under the background that electronic companies had to find their own way out, they began to introduce foreign technologies and production lines on a large scale, and the idea of ​​independent research and development began to be introduced and replaced.

This stage is a stage where China's semiconductor industry continues to catch up but is constantly being widened. The integrated circuit industry's technology iteration speed is very fast, and the technology introduced by Chinese semiconductor companies has quickly fallen behind, so they have begun to reintroduce new technologies. In this way, we fell into the vicious circle of "introduction-lagging-lagging-lagging". In addition, under the technical limitations of of Paris Coordination Committee, China has introduced all second-hand equipment eliminated by developed countries, and it is impossible to form core technological advantages at all. However, semiconductor technologies in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan are constantly being updated and iterated, and their technologies are becoming more and more advanced, and they have successively achieved technological catching up.

It can be seen that since the founding of the People's Republic of China, China's semiconductor industry has been catching up. More than half a century has passed, and the semiconductor industry still has a huge technological gap with foreign countries, and its dependence on foreign countries is very serious. However, after half a century of accumulation, the current semiconductor "high-rise buildings" in the United States are now. The emergence of Fairchild is not the only one, but it is inevitable. In the 20th century, after Fairchild, there were Intel and AMD in the United States. The rise of smartphones in the 21st century gave birth to communication chip design giants such as Qualcomm and Broadcom ; and in the era of artificial intelligence, rising stars such as Nvidia emerged. The US government regards chips as strategic, basic and pioneering industries, formulates a key technology roadmap, and clearly does not aim at short-term profitability. The US government is also creating a good industrial environment in terms of talent, investment, taxation, infrastructure construction, etc. to ensure that the US maintains its leading position at the forefront of technology.

No matter how big the steps are, you can’t reach a thousand miles. Giving China's semiconductors some time will definitely be better.